From the Desk of Dr Toni Lodge #002

Hi! Happy Thursday or whatever day it is for you!!! I have a conundrum.

The other day I was saying goodbye to someone, and said ‘ciao!’

This is pretty common, right? People who don’t speak Italian say things like ‘ciao’ at the end of a phonecall, or ‘grazie’ in a cheap Italian restaurant with waiters and waitresses who definitely do not speak Italian and have never even dreamt of visiting. We say things like ‘hola!’ to people who, also, are not Spanish.

I’ve never found myself to be cultured enough or interesting enough to drop in a ‘ciao’ or ‘hola’, and have regretted it every single time because in the nasal Australian accent I just don’t think it cuts through in the same sing-song way it does when someone else does it.

But here we are: I found myself saying ciao.

Ryan and I were in another city, another state, and the time felt right. Traveling makes you feel like a completely new person. In fact, the first morning in Sydney, Ryan and I were out for breakfast and he said ‘do you feel like a really interesting person being away from home?’

And yeah. I fucking did. As though I could achieve ANYTHING. I said ciao, and it didn’t feel cool. It felt like everything was on fire and as if the building I was in would crumble and the person I said it to may throw up.

Why don’t I have the right energy to say something as simple as ciao?!

So in case you missed it - Ryan and I are all in. On the pod, on each other, on everyone reading this right now! We quit our day jobs and this is our full-time gig now. As you know, Ryan is doing his MBA, which is some business thing for people smarter than me (for example, Ryan), and I feel like this leads into my next question. Should I learn something? And should it be another language?!

If I don’t have the social clout to say ciao in a casual manner, maybe I should learn Italian to compensate for that?!

I have a list of non-negotiables in my life, and learning a language is now on there! If you don’t have a list of non-negotiables, I strongly encourage you to write one out! Taubs and I sat down about 4 years ago and wrote down a couple of things we would NOT go to the grave without doing. It’s like a bucket list I guess, but it’s not crazy long. It’s 4 or 5 things that are just not negotiable. I myself will have completed 3 of my 5 by the end of this year.

I obviously have 1 million goals, but these are things like, big ticket things I won’t leave without doing!

BUT NOW. I’m going to add learning a language.

What should I learn? I know a tiny bit of German already, do I continue that? I also would love to do Japanese (because did you know I’ve been to Japan?) but it seems SO complicated the further in you get!

I’d also love to learn AusLan, which is Australian Sign Language.

Any language recommendations, or language learning app recommendations for me to try?!

Let me know!

Love ya! T x
P.S please appreciate the photoshop skillz shown below xxx